Posts Tagged ‘trip’

I have a few more things to toss in my suitcase, but I am 85% of the way there and that feels lovely.

I was just going to leave it for tomorrow, but when I pulled out my suitcase from the closet I just naturally threw some things in and the next thing you know I’m just about done.

I have more outfits than I probably need, but I figure I may want to have day outfits and night outfits.

I also figured out what shoes to wear with my little black dress, which frankly was a relief as I actually did go shoe shopping today and found nothing.

Note to self.

I don’t ever need to go to Stonestown Mall again.

I don’t often frequent malls and there is a good reason why.

I actually bought nothing there and I was pretty damn proud of myself that I got out unscathed.

I met with my person tonight and told him how my brain wants me to ruin my whole trip because I can’t find the proper shoes for this one dress.

We both laughed uproariously.

I was serious and not all at the same time.

And then when I got home tonight from doing the deal I just pulled the dress, put it on and tried on all the shoes.

And I found the ones that worked

I also threw in an extra pair of shoes and an extra dress just for fun in case I decide to go with something else.

But really.

I am totally covered.

One little black dress, two black sundresses, one that is flowy and delicate and could easily translate into an evening dress.

One pair of vintage bib overalls because I fancy them and they’ll be fun to wear when I’m tooling around the museums.

One boho flowy off the shoulder navy blue/indigo dress with purple flowers.

Perfect for brunch at Balthazar.

The new red dress I picked up at Anthropologie which could be both day or night.

I mean.

I have more than enough clothes.

Plus I have my travel outfit picked out and ready for putting on tomorrow.

Something that will be comfortable to travel in and chic enough to land in New York city and blend right on in to the masses.

I feel really happy and quite astounded that the day is finally coming that I get to go on this trip that I have had planned since March.

Tomorrow will end up being a touch busier than I was originally going to be, but only because I agreed to be of service and drive my person around town after I get back from my car maintenance service in Berkeley.

I figure it will be nice to help him run some errands in my car and we’ll have a nice lunch together before I head out.

I won’t really meet up with him next week as I’ll be getting in Sunday from my trip at the time we normally meet.

It will be fun to just hang out with him.

He sees me so well and I am happy to get to spend time with him.

I have a package to drop off and a letter to mail, rent to pay for July, since I will be getting back on July 1st I just figure I will pay my rent before I go, like I usually do, a week in advance.

That way I won’t be tempted to overspend on the trip.

I have enough money for my travels and what I want to do, but I’d rather have the rent paid before I go then wait until afterward.

Yup.

I’m ready.

Just a little laundry in the wash now and I’ll put clean sheets on my bed in the morning.

It’s lovely to travel and I have such a good time doing it.

But it’s also, always, really nice to come home.

And nothing is better than coming home to a clean house and a fresh made bed.

I feel pretty squared away on everything that needs to be done and just ready to hop on that plane and fly out.

Super grateful for this time and that I get to go.

I love traveling.

This will be my third time to New York.

I realized today too, that every time I have gone I have stayed at an Air BnB in Brooklyn.

One on Myrtle Ave in Bushwick.

One on Dekalb Ave in Clinton Hill.

And this one I’ll be staying at is on Lafayette Avenue in Bed-Stuy.

It appears that I like Brooklyn.

Or that I like that it’s cheaper to stay there then in the city proper.

I do think there will be a time when I stay in Manhattan itself.

For now though, I am truly happy I get to go and I have a great place to stay and so many awesome things that are planned to do, I’m over the moon.

My boss will be dropping off one of my charges at a summer camp and not back to the house until fifteen minutes after I would normally be starting, so she said, come in fifteen minutes late.

I’ll take it.

I will take any little squeak of time I can get.

I talked about time a lot with my therapist.

How it is a commodity.

How I have often felt that I don’t have enough of it.

(Love)

(Time)

(Money)

All the scarcity that I have dealt with in my life, how embracing abundance can be challenging and sometimes when I have it I want to spend it all, frivolous and mad, just to have it gone again so I can go back to a place of comfortable discomfort.

That didn’t come up so much, but I can see that pattern there in the background looming and lurking there.

I see you, I say to it, it’s ok, it’s going to be alright, you can buy those shoes.

You can book that trip.

You can have a nice cup of coffee.

You can do for you.

Heck.

You can do for others.

The gift of being able to give my friend baby gifts and food, that felt so wonderful, I love gifting things.

The gift of giving my writing, that can be so astounding for me to share.

So vulnerable.

What I was talking to my therapist about was this thing that happens with me in my group supervision and has happened for me on occasion, ok, more than on occasion, in school, is a distaste for people who waste time, who dilly dally, who are not clear, who can’t make discerning conclusions, who have to be led, who haven’t done the work, who are sloppy.

Messy.

Not put together, and not in the way that sounds, I mean, not concise with their language, thoughts, ideas.

Don’t waste my fucking time.

I don’t have enough of it and you’re not getting to the fucking point fast enough.

GET TO THE MOTHERFUCKING POINT.

BITCHES.

I mean.

Please.

My therapist points out, “sounds like judgement.”

Ugh.

Yes.

I know it’s judgement.

But what she then did was spin it so eloquently, so aptly, so delicate and with such a tactful manner that I got it, I got to work right through it and see that when I am in judgement I am defending some part of myself that I am not happy about.

I don’t want to be messy.

I don’t want to be disorganized.

I don’t want to be scattered.

And I never really am.

I am so super on top of shit it’s a little intense.

I do my work.

I do my work.

I do my work.

And then some.

And it can be a control thing, duh.

So much control, so much safety, comfort in the bound parts of me, comfort in the restricting.

I’ve never been messy about my trauma.

Or traumas.

Or the traumatic things in my life.

There’s a list, look them up elsewhere in my blog, this is not about the list, this is about the fact that it was never ok to be messy and upset about it.

Soldier the fuck on.

Chin up kid.

Clear your fucking plate.

Eat your food.

Don’t cry.

And God forbid don’t act like anything is anything but normal.

Normal.

What the fuck is that?

So.

I squashed it down.

I squashed all the messy and teary and hurt and angry and vengeful parts of me down.

I stuffed it down.

I ate too much food.

I escaped into fantasy.

I escaped into taking care of others.

So much easier to focus on another person’s problems rather than my own.

I smoked it down.

I snorted it down.

I drank it down.

And as I was expressing to my therapist, I realize I really just don’t let myself get messy, vulnerable, or dirty.

Except.

Well.

I do.

In one area.

And we talked about that and I cried a bit and I laughed a lot and I outlined the messy and then I outlined the happy and the love and the feelings and the experiences and it was really good to share.

And she reflected back to me and showed me how brave it was to not eat, drink, smoke, or do lines of cocaine to deal with all that hurt and that I have been doing the work and it really does show and that it’s obvious that things are changing in my life because I am being more vulnerable, less guarded, I’m letting things in.

I’m in my voice.

I haven’t lost it.

I am asking for what I want and saying what is in my heart and it’s glorious.

I am seen.

And it feels just fucking smashing.

So.

Um.

Yeah.

I had a good session today.

And then off to work, busy day, full day, lots of juggling baby and siblings and cooking and laundry and lots of sweet snuggles with the oldest boy who read a book with me about stars.

“Are we really made from stars?” He asked me.

“Yes,” I told him, and kissed the top of his head, “you are a multitude of stars, you shine.”

A dear friend of mine is traveling cross-country on his motorcycle and I have been getting texts and random messages at the oddest times of the day—usually when I am fretting about something and feeling anxious—that remind me to live life fully.

Postcards from the edge.

One, actual postcard I received in the mail yesterday from Idaho—Crater of the Moon.

I have also gotten to track his progress through the posted photographs on the social media sites, camping in Minnesota, Niagara Falls from the Canadian side, summer travels through the Midwest, and now the coasts of Maine—lobster roll anyone?

I received a message of another sort today, the brother of my darling friend who passed away, far too young, will be in town next week and wants to get together.

His brother’s passing will mark its 7th year anniversary at the end of this month.

I always think of him in July, when the fog is thick and lowly along the coasts, when I want to be bundled in warm layers and scarves, when the smell of the sea is super saturating the city and the sidewalks are wet in the morning, the pavement damp not from an overnight shower, but from the thick overhanging mists that envelop the buildings and hug the coast line.

I always have this memory of watching the fog roll in over Twin Peaks, heavy, majestic, unstoppable.

Death coming for my friend who lay in a coma for a week before passing.

The fog a kind of death shroud swooping in to take him away from me.

Half his ashes are in Maine.

My friend on his motorcycle heading into Maine, my friend who passed being from Maine, so many little mysterious circles within circles.

I will see the brother next Sunday at a café in the Mission that I am fairly certain has gluten free options—he has Celiac’s disease and has to avoid all things gluten—to catch up and give him a really big hug.

It’s been a few years now since I have seen him or his family, though we do keep in touch and I always talk about getting back out to Maine to see his parents, his mom especially who I connected so well with. The entire family, really, but the time just keeps slipping past and I haven’t made it there in about five years.

I still experience some grief around my friends passing, but it is softened and muted by the passage of time a foggy mitten swaddling the memory and a brief stab that will bring tears to my eyes, but not the torrential sobbing that once engulfed me.

I hope to be of service to his brother.

I hope to show him that my life has been good in the ensuing years.

It is a life that looks often times different from what I want it to look like, but one that I think my dear friend would appreciate. Although, I hazard he would find something to give me grief about.

Like all good friends do.

They know your spots and poke them and elicit that response that endears you to them because they make you see how silly you are and how human and they accept you for it, warts and all.

I can look around my humble abode and yes, humble it is, but sweet too, and me, it’s me and that’s what my friend taught me the most, I think, over time with perspective, that there’s nothing wrong with me.

“Be the ball, Martines, let them come to you.” He told me when I was achy to rush after some unavailable man.

“You’re not going to relapse.” He said another time when I was pouting about something insignificant and being a drama queen about it.

“You have a kind of faith that I can’t fathom, it’s like this razor’s edge of faith, you just believe and believe and believe and you are taken care of.” He paused, “I don’t know that I believe like that.”

I shoved him

He did believe.

He believed in goodness and kindness and dancing and being sweet and he loved me despite myself getting in the way of that love.

I have trepidation about seeing his brother and I could say it’s because I have not made enough with my life, what ever that is, that he’ll see me and wonder why didn’t I die? Why did his brother? What have I done with my life, would his brother have done more?

But that is ego and false and dishonest and well, bullshit.

The reason is I don’t want to feel the pain and the loss again, I don’t want my heart to get broke open again, as it always seems to do in July, when the fog descends upon me and the days are full of pearly light diffused through the seas grief and my blood feels strong in my veins with longing for love.

I wish my friend on his cross-country trip safe travels knowing that there is no such thing as safe travels, it’s all a risk, but a risk worth taking, a life worth living.

My friend who passed would be proud of me for getting up and taking risks, for moving to Paris, for humbly moving back, for being human, for still chasing after the ball once in a while, but for the most part learning how to be still and be approached.

Of course the ankle injury helped with that one.

I look forward to swapping tales from the road with my travelling friend as I look forward to continuing to get out there and take risks myself.

And to sit in a café and look at the sweet resemblance of a man I once knew, who knew me so well, who honored me with his love and friendship, who filled his home with vases of white French tulips and candles and heaps of friends when I got a year sober, who told me that I was worth it and so much more.

Who never failed to be there for me, putting an arm around me when I needed it most.

May I honor that friend, those memories, and that legacy by being the same kind of person.